Stupid Attempts At Linking Policies Live On
from the welcome-to-the-internet dept
It used to be quite common for web sites to bury linking policies in their terms of use, asserting that people needed permission to link to them, and could only do so in certain ways. Most people have figured out that's pretty ridiculous, but every once in a while, some lawyer who doesn't understand the internet at all puts together the TOS for a site, and includes some stupid "you have to ask before you link to us" policy. The link is one of the elements that makes the web what it is; it's sort of the point that people can use links to direct visitors to other places, enabling the spreading and sharing of all sorts of information. Linking is not copyright infringement, it's not a violation of a terms of service, it's not illegal -- it's a key part of the web. But somebody at the Financial Times, or its law firm, hasn't figured out that it's a good thing for people to link to one of their new sites, and has inserted a stupid linking policy into its TOS. Here's an idea: if they don't want people linking to the site, people should oblige them and not link to it. Want to try and control or limit how people send you traffic? Fine -- don't reap any of the benefits of inbound links, and take yourself out of Google and other search engines while you're at it.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: linking policies
Companies: financial times
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Movie Quote
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Oh, whoops. Too late.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Wow
The ToS applies only to people visiting the actual site; it cannot dictate behavior of people at other sites. THEY NEVER AGREED TO THE TOS!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
This actually sense during a closed and private beta.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
linking
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: linking
Uh, no that shouldn't be illegal either. There are ways to prevent this from happening that don't require the legal system. Violating a site's TOS is not a violation of the law.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
;)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Weird Harold
Strange, I thought you were on the side of the Good Guys, and against copyright theft. Odd to see you advocating stealing in this way.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} badsite.com [NC,OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} anotherbadsite.com
RewriteRule .* - [F]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Strange, I thought you were on the side of the Good Guys, and against copyright theft. Odd to see you advocating stealing in this way.
------------
Maybe WH is turning a corner and is seeing some of this stuff for the absurdity that it is? Taht Copyright is not absolute, and even when its in play doesnt mean you SHOULD force it all over everything? We can only hope.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Hopefully they will let Google and Yahoo know about their wishes not to be linked.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Hide Warlord
Yes, that seems to be the usual excuse of you freetard copyright thieves. You "don't have to think" about how much your actions are costing the copyright owners in lost revenue, you just want everything for free.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
They took said newspapers out of their index.
The Belgians made an U-turn in a couple of weeks. I shudder to think just how low their online readership must had sunk during that time.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The UK government's doing it too
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Referrer!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I avoid stupid sites like these, don't you?
Pretty simple, the more user friendly you make your* site:
(1) page URLs that don't expire,
(2) fair use policies,
(3) minimal loading time (e.g. flash me only if you have to),
(4) easy navigation,
(5) using google for search (don't force people to use your brain dead search engine - ala MS),
(6) javascript only required for interaction - not for content delivery
the more likely you will succeed in keeping eyeballs on your site. After all, there are at least a dozen or more sites just like yours that we will run to if you fail to meet these expectations.
* directed toward brain dead companies like Financial Times - which has over a dozen well known competitors.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I didn't get it with the lawyer bit
[ link to this | view in chronology ]